1. History of the late Polish Revolution and the Events of the Campaign. By JOSEPH HORDYNSKI. 2. Tableau de la Pologne, ancienne et moderne. Nouvelle Edition, entièrement refondue, augmentée et ornée de cartes. Par LEONARD CHODZKO. 3. Polonia, or Monthly Reports on Polish Affairs. The Reports of the American Temperance Society, and of the New York State Temperance Society. 1. Correspondence between Governor Hamilton and Vice President Calhoun, July and August, 1832. 2. Addresses and Reports of the Convention held at Columbia, S. C. in November, 1832. 3. An Ordinance to nullify certain Acts of the Congress of the United States, purporting to be Laws, laying Duties and Imposts on the Importation of for- eign Coinmodities. II. SPANISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE Coleccion de Poesias Castellanas anteriores al Siglo XV. Por D. Thomas Antonio Sanchez. IV. Tom. Madrid. 1779-1790. A Collection of Cas- tilian Poems anterior to the XVth Century. III. McILVAINE'S EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY The Evidences of Christianity, in their external Division, exhibited in a Course of Lectures deliv- ered in Clinton Hall, in the Winter of 1831-2, under the Appointment of the University of the City of New York. By CHARLES P. McILVAINE, D. D., Rector of St Ann's Church, Brooklyn; Pro- fessor of the Evidences of Revealed Religion and 2. Remarks on the Study of the Civil Law. From the American Jurist, No. III. 3. An Address delivered at the Dedication of Dane Law College in Harvard University, October 23, 1832. By JOSIAH QUINCY, LL. D., President Idées sur la Philosophie de l'Histoire de l'Human- ité précédé d'une Introduction. Par EDGAR QUInet. The Pilgrim's Progress. With a Life of John Bunyan. By ROBERT SOUTHEY, Esq., LL. D., NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW. No. LXXVIII. JANUARY, 1833. ART. I.-Prince Pückler Muscau and Mrs. Trollope. 1. Domestic Manners of the Americans. By Mrs. TROLLOPE. New York. 1832. 2. Tour in Germany, Holland, and England in the Years 1826, 1827, and 1828, in a Series of Letters by a German Prince. In 4 vols. In 4 vols. London. 1832. We presume that all our readers have become acquainted with the first named of these works, either by reading the book itself, or the reviews of it and extracts from it. The other work named may not be so well known. It is a series of anonymous letters, addressed apparently to a German princess, detailing the observations of the writer, who would seem to be her husband, on his tour through the countries enumerated in the title of the book, and particularly England and Ireland. Doubts existed at first as to the authenticity of the German Prince's tour. The admirable spirit, with which the English translation is executed, gave it the air of an original. It is now, however, admitted to be the work of Prince Pückler Muscau, a Prussian nobleman of ancient family and high rank, and, if we may judge from the display of six or seven stars and orders in his portrait, at the beginning of the third volume, a person of high consideration among the continental princes. His book, without having the least reference to America, is the best possible answer to Mrs. Trollope. In the words of Mr. Ouseley, whose own liberal and intelligent essay on the statistics VOL. XXXVI.-NO. 78. 1 of the United States is known to many of our readers, his work is a fulsome éloge of English usages compared with Mrs. Trollope's account of American manners.' What this eulogium, in itself considered, is, must be pretty well known to our readers from the English reviewers. His temper is wholly unlike that which is evinced in Mrs. Trollope's work ;-but he gives full scope to the spirit of fault-finding, and leaps from very slender premises to exceedingly disparaging conclusions, often, we are sure, with the widest possible departure, however unintentional, from truth and justice. In doing this, it is amusing to observe, that he frequently sets down England as peculiarly deficient in those very things, with regard to which Mrs. Trollope places the Americans in the most disadvantageous contrast with her countrymen. Thus our readers will bear in mind, how much is said in the work which bears this lady's name, of the insignificance of the women in America, the neglect of their education, and their depressed state in society. Precisely the same is said of the English ladies by the Prince, who certainly possessed vastly greater opportunities than Mrs. Trollope, of speaking advisedly of the subject. The English, like true Turks, (says he) keep the intellects of their wives and daughters in as narrow bounds as possible, with a view of securing their absolute and exclusive property in them as much as possible, and in general their success is perfect.' The London Quarterly reviewer quotes with great satisfaction what Mrs. Trollope says of the insignificance of the American women. But why may not her judgment on this point be as erroneous as the Prince's? 6 We intend, in the course of this article, occasionally to cite the Prince, as an offset to Mrs. Trollope; and when we say that we believe them, though erring under different influences, to be about equally entitled to credit, we have surely said enough to prevent our friends in England from supposing, that we adopt the noble traveller's libels. We read his book with alternate amusement and disgust; but his opportunities of approaching the élite of English society render it, in one respect, much more offensive than Mrs. Trollope,-we mean its personality. He has treated many English families, and English gentlemen and ladies, as Americans have often been treated; accepted their hospitality, and then paraded their names and the gossip he heard at their tables, in his book. Of this sin Mrs. Trollope is guiltless. |